Sunday 21 March 2010

Office 2010 Beta Downloads Available to the Public

Earlier this week Microsoft announced that Office 2010 became available for download as a Beta. The catch was that only MSN and TechNet subscribers could download the software at the time (no, we’re not counting all the users who downloaded the software off torrent sites). Rumor on the web had it that Microsoft would soon make the software available to the general public.

After all, the Office 2010 Beta site was already up and running and it already displayed download links for Office Home and Business 2010 Beta, Office Professional 2010 Beta and Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta. As it turns out, the rumors came true and Microsoft did indeed release the Office 2010 Beta productivity suite to the awaiting masses. It did not release all three versions, just Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta, the Office 2010 version that has everything but the kitchen sink. It is also the Office 2010 version that will be marketed though volume licensing only, so this my be your only chance to put it through its paces.

“The Office Home and Business 2010 beta and Office Professional 2010 beta will be available soon. Please come back and try again. The Office Professional Plus 2010 beta is available for download now,” says Microsoft on this download page.

To put things in perspective, here’s what you can expect to get from the three Office 2010 Beta versions mentioned above:

Office Home and Business 2010 Beta – includes Excel, PowerPoint, Office Web Apps, OneNote, Outlook, and Word.
Office Professional 2010 Beta – includes Access, Excel, Office Web Apps, OneNote, Outlook, PowerPoint, and Publisher
Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta - includes Access, Communicator, Excel, Infopath, Office Web Apps, OneNote, Outlook, PowerPoint, Publisher, and SharePoint Workspace.

To run Office 2010 Beta you will have to go do abide to the following:
  1. Your system must meet the minimal system requirements. The minimal system requirements are: 500MHz processor, 256MB RAM memory, 3GB free HDD space. Microsoft explained that if our system can run or already runs a previous Office version, it should run Office 2010 Beta just fine.
  2. You must register to download the Office 2010 Beta. Start here.

Monday 11 August 2008